


The Trophy Husband

by LadyRhiyana



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: ALL the fluff and sweetness, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Crossdressing, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Romantic Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-12
Updated: 2020-09-12
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:15:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26420239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyRhiyana/pseuds/LadyRhiyana
Summary: 5 variations on the theme of trophy husband-boyfriend-lover Jaime.Featuring: inquisitive co-workers; rivals for Jaime's affection; a little bit of role-playing; Jaime with a 50K-dragon dowry; and Brienne winning the hand of Lord Tywin's *daughter*.
Relationships: Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth
Comments: 46
Kudos: 213





	The Trophy Husband

**Author's Note:**

> Canon authenticity? What's that! These bits of fluff contain absolutely no canon authenticity whatsoever. 
> 
> Please enjoy!

**1.**

“His dowry is fifty thousand gold dragons,” her father said. He sighed and smoothed out the scrap of parchment, the red wax seal of House Lannister still visible. “Brienne, sweetling, this is not an opportunity we can afford to pass up.”

Pacing restlessly around her father’s study, Brienne felt the bonds of duty and obligation closing in on her, and longed for escape. “What’s wrong with him?” she demanded, suspicious. “If Lord Tywin is looking to Tarth for a wife, if his dowry is that high –”

Her father coughed. “There are some – unseemly whispers. I don’t believe a word of them, and nor should you.”

“Father –” she stopped pacing, sighed. “I don’t need a husband. I can look after Tarth myself. I’ve been dealing with the smallfolk for years, and I’m on good terms with the traders. If Essosi pirates attack, I can fend them off myself. What am I supposed to do with him?”

Her father gave her a wry look. “If you need me to tell you that, daughter –”

“No!” she said quickly. “I’m not interested in any of – that. In fact I think I’m much better off without it.”

“Well, you may not need a husband, but Tarth needs fifty thousand gold dragons. The husband simply comes with the gold.”

She made a face. “Oh, very well. I suppose he can entertain himself while I go about my business.”

**

It was a fine plan. They sent their agreement to Tywin Lannister, and Brienne returned to the every day business of looking after Tarth. Days, weeks and even months passed, and as she was caught up in the harvest and a tangled dispute between trading ships and even an incursion by pirates on the eastern side of the island, she soon forgot all about her bridegroom and his fifty thousand gold dragons.

And then one day a Lannister ship sailed into the harbour, its sails blood red and a great snarling lion for a figurehead.

She threw on her best clothes and rode down to meet it, and was in time to see the sailors unloading chest after heavy chest of Lannister gold. She stared at it hungrily, already calculating how best to spend it.

A man clearing his throat caught her attention.

She looked up to see the most beautiful creature she’d ever seen, dressed in crimson and gold and frowning at her in disapproval. However, as she gaped at him, her face growing blotchy red, he slowly smiled –

Her mind went blank.

“Hello,” he said. “Is it enough, do you think?”

She blinked at him.

“My dowry. Is it enough to convince you to marry me?”

“Oh,” she said, her tongue tangled and her heart pounding double-time. “No. I mean yes. Yes, I think I – I think I would like to marry you, if you don’t mind.”

He only laughed.

**

**2.**

It was Tuesday night. Brienne was reading in bed, and Jaime was going through the depths of his closet, searching for something – Brienne wasn’t quite sure what – pulling out clothes he hadn’t worn since their foolish college days, before they’d even got married. 

She made low, affirmative humming sounds as he spoke, mainly to himself; she had a good book, and she wanted to see how this chapter would end before she turned in. She had an early meeting the next day, and she wanted to be rested.

She looked up when she heard him laugh.

“Look at this!” he said, as he pulled out his old, battered leather jacket and a pair of scarred jeans.

“Oh,” Brienne said, startled. And then, in another tone: “Oh. Jaime. Do you still have the boots and the tight shirt?” 

He threw her a grinning look over his shoulder, dug around some more and came up with the old boots and the shirt – together with the jacket and jeans, clothes he had worn when he’d still owned his motorbike, before the accident.

“Well?” he asked.

“Go on,” she said eagerly.

He stripped off his shirt and his trousers, standing there in only his boxers, and shimmied into the jeans. They were tight-fitting, lovingly highlighting every curve and muscle, riding low on his hips. He pulled on the shirt, once white but now a faded grey streaked with ancient oil-stains and worn to a soft texture that she had loved to stroke, once. She cast her book aside, threw off the covers and went to him, impulsively, and trailed her hand over that delicious softness, warmed by the heat of his body –

“Off, off, hands off,” he said, grinning, trying to fend her off.

Before she could grab him again, he pulled on the leather jacket, and she sighed as she slipped her arms around his waist and breathed in the unmistakable scent of it.

He’d gotten a bit lazy about shaving lately; he rubbed his three-day stubble against her cheek, and she stepped back and looked at him, as she had not really looked at him in a while.

He really was quite extraordinarily beautiful. She forgot, sometimes – habit and long familiarity desensitising her.

“Well?” he said again, turning in a little circle for her.

She clicked her tongue. “Mess up your hair a bit more,” she said. “Let me put on my best suit. And then –” she met his eyes, and swallowed, “you can be my bit of rough.”

******

**3.**

She was the Chief Operations Manager (Natural Resources) of Lanniscorp. This meant, essentially, she was in charge of the company’s vast and far-flung mining operations, from the great tunnels beneath Casterly Rock to the emerald mines in the jungles of Sothyros, to the jade mines in farthest Yi Ti and even the marble mines of Tarth.

She spent her days dealing with the thousands of impossible problems that came from wresting gold, ore and precious stones from the earth – cave-ins; strikes; thefts; protection rackets; environmental protests. It was a hard, physically demanding job, and often the problems required hard, physically demanding solutions. She had faced shouting picket lines and squared off against huge burly drunks, meeting them blow for blow with her fists; she had chaired stakeholder meetings in air-conditioned offices in Lanniscorp, dressed in a suit and tie.

She had worked deep underground, thousands of metres below the earth; she had trekked through humid jungles and high into the mountains and even below the sea.

And all of it, all of it, was fuelled by white-hot ambition and determination to win Tywin Lannister’s approval – for the ruthless, hard-fisted CEO of Lanniscorp played his chief executives against each other for his own amusement, and the two bitterest rivals of them all were Brienne Tarth – his foster-daughter, child of his old business partner – and his own daughter, Cersei.

Ever since they were children growing up together in Casterly Rock, Brienne and Cersei had competed and fought each other over everything. When they were young, it had been academic and sporting honours. As they grew older, they fought over respect. Power. Tywin’s approval.

But their bitterest division was their war for Jaime’s affections.

**

It was late on Friday afternoon when she came out of the deep caverns at Castamere, her face and hands black with sweat and grime, to find Jaime waiting for her, leaning against his bright red Valyrian. He was dressed in an expensive white shirt and designer jeans, his golden hair gleaming in the fading light.

She had known him almost all her life. She knew his strengths – and his weaknesses – and his careless, lazy kindness. Still, she was always startled by how beautiful he was.

“Jaime,” she said faintly. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to see you, of course,” he said with a lazy smile. “I haven’t seen you in weeks. What impossible task has Father set you now?”

He opened the passenger door for her, ushered her in despite her protests about his leather seats and her dirty hands.

“There was another cave-in at Castamere,” she said. “Water cascading through the tunnels. We had to pump it out.”

“Sounds awful,” he said, making a face. “Still, if you’re done now – perhaps we can go get dinner? My treat.” He grinned, and slung his arm around her shoulders.

He smelled of expensive cologne, clean clothes and his own, indefinable scent.

She swallowed thickly. “Perhaps,” she said tentatively, “we could skip dinner?”

He laughed. “Now that’s my kind of idea.”

**

He drove her back, not to her accommodation on the mine site, but to the most expensive hotel in town. He tossed the keys carelessly to the valet and led her inside, blithely ignoring the doorman’s startled look at Brienne, and put his arm around her waist as he led her to the lifts.

As soon as the lift doors closed behind them, she was on him, her hands tangled in his hair and her body pressing him against the wall. She devoured his mouth, dragged greedily at his dress shirt until she could get her hands on his warm skin, and sighed as he dragged her impossibly close, his legs widening so that they rocked together, panting into each other’s mouths.

The chiming of the lift interrupted them, and they momentarily disentangled themselves, only long enough to make it to the door to the penthouse suite. He pressed her hard against the door, kissing her, as he fumbled with the key-card; when the lock disengaged she dragged him inside, stripped off his shirt and threw him down on the bed.

**

Afterwards, when he lay sleeping, sprawled against the white sheets like a golden god, Brienne could not resist – she took a picture of him* and sent it to Cersei.

**

**4.**

It was Friday evening in Lannisport, and a small group of staff from the Lannisport Museum of Natural History were having after-work drinks.

“So,” Margaery said, sidling closer to their newest co-worker, Brienne Tarth, “tell me about Jaime.”

Brienne blinked at her. “Jaime?”

“Your boyfriend, darling. You did say you had one, didn’t you? And that his name was Jaime?”

“Ye-es,” Brienne said slowly. “But I don’t really –” 

“Tell us all about him,” Margaery coaxed her. “We want to know _everything_.”

It wasn’t malicious. Brienne was simply so reticent, so slow to share personal details, and Margaery and the others were unrepentant gossips.

A couple of weeks ago, Brienne had let slip, casually, that she had moved to Lannisport from Tarth to live with her boyfriend Jaime. And there had been nothing since.

[ _“She’s got no social media presence at all,” Renly marvelled. “In this day and age!”_

_“I wonder how many Jaimes there are in Lannisport,” Sansa mused. “Do you think if we…?”_

_“No way,” Asha said. “There are Jaimes and Jays and Jasons by the score. It’s an old Lannister name, and there are more Lannisters, Lannetts, Lannys and Lantells in this city than you can shake a stick at.”_

_“Do you think maybe she made him up?” Loras asked._

_They thought on this for a few moments._

_“No,” Margaery said finally. “Brienne doesn’t lie. She may not share much, but she doesn’t lie.”_ ]

“Jaime is –” Brienne paused, gathering her thoughts – and Margaery marvelled, once more, at how careful and thoughtful she was, for such a physically imposing woman. “Jaime isn’t _nice_ ,” she finally began. “He’s not even particularly kind, or gentle. But he understands me, in a way no one else ever has. And he accepts me for who I am.” She looked at Margaery and the others. “Is that – is that what you were after?”

Margaery blinked a little, and had to take a sip of her cocktail before she could speak. That had been more heartfelt than she’d bargained for.

“Yes,” she said faintly. “Yes, that’s –”

“He’s a curator as well,” Brienne continued, after a moment. “But he works at the Hall of Heroes, up at the Rock.”

**

Naturally, they had to follow up on this new lead.

They drew straws, and the next Monday Loras and Renly found themselves driving up the long and torturous mountain road that led from Lannisport to the great fortress of Casterly Rock.

“Find out everything you can,” Margaery had ordered them.

“Take pictures!” Sansa had said.

“But try not to look suspicious,” Asha had said. “Security doesn’t play around up there.”

Around lunchtime, Margaery’s phone pinged.

She looked down to see that Loras had sent her a slightly blurred photo, taken from a distance at extreme zoom. She opened it, stared very wide-eyed, and hurried over to grab Sansa and drag her outside.

“Look!” she hissed, thrusting the phone in Sansa’s face. “ _This is Jaime!”_

Sansa let out a long, admiring breath. Brienne’s Jaime, the curator who worked at the Hall of Heroes, was tall and blonde, with green eyes and sleek black-framed glasses. He had _curls_.

“Oh wow,” Margaery sighed. “Go Brienne!”

Just as she said that, Brienne walked out, her bag slung over her shoulder. She gave Margaery a startled look.

“Never mind!” Margaery said, beaming.

**

At the next after-work drinks, Brienne looked up from her phone with a secret, fond smile. “I hope you don’t mind if Jaime comes?” she asked. “He said he wanted to meet the people I work with.”

Renly and Loras looked frantically around as though searching for an escape.

“No!” Sansa said brightly. “We’d love that. Wouldn’t we, Margaery?”

“Yes,” Margaery agreed. “I would love to meet Jaime.”

In person, Brienne’s Jaime – Jaime _Lannister,_ oh gods – was tall, beautiful, and had a smile like a shark. Loras’ photo – and the black-framed glasses – had been entirely deceptive; the man was a lion in tweed clothing.

“Pleased to meet you all,” he said with his sharp-toothed smile. He shifted his gaze to Loras and Renly, and his eyes sharpened. “But haven’t I met you two before? I feel sure I would remember you.”

******

**5.**

When Brienne pulled off her helm and revealed herself to be a woman, there was an audible hush, and then a rushing of murmurs and even a few bursts of crowing laughter, hastily shushed.

She had not expected triumphant cheering, but this was –

A young page in crimson and red livery approached her, his eyes wide. “Lord Tywin bids the victor approach,” he said, in his piping treble voice. “What is your name, ser knight?”

She scowled. She knew her face must be bright red, her hair lank and sweaty, but there was no need to insult her.

“I am Brienne of Tarth,” she said defiantly. “Men call me Brienne the Beauty.”

The page ran back to the herald, passing on the information, and soon the herald cried in a great voice: “Brienne the Beauty, come forth to receive your reward!” 

Laughter came again from the crowd. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lannister guardsmen searching the assembled smallfolk for the offenders.

She strode up to the great dais where Lord Tywin Lannister, the Lord of Casterly Rock, sat in his great chair. By his side were his daughter, Lady Cersei – called the Light of the West – and his son and heir, Ser Jaime Lannister. Brother and sister were as alike as two peas in a pod, gold-haired and green-eyed and beautiful, except that Ser Jaime was smiling in lazy amusement and Lady Cersei’s mouth was twisted in resentment and distaste.

“So it is true,” Lord Tywin said, his voice like ice. “You are a woman.” His own expression was thunderous. “And yet you are the victor of the jousting, and I am bound by my word.”

He hated being made a laughingstock, Brienne remembered. There had been some story about his father.

“Fifty thousand gold dragons I promised the victor,” the Lord of Casterly Rock continued. “And my daughter’s hand in marriage.”

Brienne’s heart stopped. This was – she had not expected _this_.

Lady Cersei stood up from her chair, her green eyes sparking in outrage. “Father!” she cried. “You cannot mean it. I will not marry this – this _beast_.”

**

They were married that very night.

Brienne wore breeches and a blue velvet surcoat emblazoned with the arms of Tarth. Her bride wore a crimson silk gown embroidered with gold lions. Her golden curls, falling about her face and her rather sharp jaw, were threaded with pearls and emeralds, and she wore silk gloves.

She was beautiful, her green eyes bright and fierce, her features as perfect as Brienne’s were mismatched and unfortunate.

When Brienne swept off Lady Cersei’s maiden cloak and draped a cloak of rose and azure around her shoulders, she could smell the dizzying scent of her perfume, some rich exotic spice, and her senses swam; she was surprised to find Lady Cersei’s shoulders so broad, and that she was only an inch or so shorter than Brienne’s own height.

But as the septon bound their hands together and they spoke their vows – Lady Cersei’s voice, too, was lower and richer than Brienne expected, though not unpleasing – the onlookers cheered and finally they were man and wife. Well. Woman and wife.

The feast was interminable. The guests cheered her and made endless toasts, though under Lord Tywin’s cold eye they stopped short of mocking her and her bride. On her left hand, her new good-father glared furiously at her all through the feast. On her right side, Lady Cersei sat silently nursing her fourth glass of wine.

Ser Jaime was nowhere to be seen.

Brienne stole a glance at her. “I know this is not what you wanted,” she said. “I will try to be a good wife.”

For some reason, that made Lady Cersei’s red mouth curl into a smile. Brienne had thought her cruel, at first glance, and perhaps she was – but bright ironic humour danced in her green eyes, and she had a most engaging pair of dimples.

For a sudden, dizzying moment, Brienne wanted to kiss her.

When the cry went up for the bedding, her new bride looked alarmed. Brienne stood, scraping her chair back and rising to her great height. She glowered around at the hall. “There will be no bedding,” she announced in her coldest voice.

She took Lady Cersei’s hand, and led her from the table.

**

She carried her new bride over the threshold.

This made Lady Cersei laugh, for some reason – especially when Brienne staggered under her unexpected weight and nearly dropped her. She was much heavier than she looked.

**

As soon as the door closed behind them, leaving them alone in the firelit marriage chamber, Lady Cersei slipped out of her delicate embroidered slippers and sank down on a chair by the fire.

“Gods above, I’m glad that’s over,” she said – in a voice that made Brienne stare.

Her new bride was unwinding the chain of pearls and emeralds from her hair, tossing it carelessly aside on a little table, and shaking back her golden curls – shorter than Brienne had realised. She was stripping off her silken gloves to reveal hands that were not quite the pale, soft, elegant hands of a lady, and twisting around to try and unlace the back of her gown –

“Help me get this thing off, will you?” she asked, presenting her back to Brienne. “This corset is _strangling_ me.”

Numb, Brienne crossed over to her and began to unlace the crimson silk gown, her fingers burning where she brushed against her bride’s warm back. By the time she had unhooked the tight, constricting corset and helped to lift it away, she rested her hand between her bride’s strong, muscular shoulders, feeling the shift of strong muscle and bone, and she _knew_.

“Where is your sister?” she asked in a numb voice, her blood beating slow and painfully in her veins.

Ser Jaime Lannister shrugged out of the bodice of his gown and let the whole thing fall to the floor, leaving him clad only in a pair of very thin breeches. He shrugged. “By now? Halfway to Essos, I should think, with her Dornish prince.”

He looked at her, his eyes bright and laughing. “She was rather counting on Prince Oberyn to win, you know. When the blue mystery knight came out of nowhere to carry all before him – well.” He paused. “Are you very upset? Did you have your heart set on marrying her?”

“I did not know that she was to be the prize,” Brienne said. “I thought it was only fifty thousand dragons.”

“Ah.” He examined her, sprawled at his ease half-naked before the fire. Stripped of feminine illusion, it was impossible to see him as anything other than a man: he was lean, lithe, golden and beautiful. “Well. If it means anything to you, I am sorry for the deception.”

“I did not dare dream that I would ever –” her voice grew choked, and she turned away, blinking back tears.

“What’s this?” he asked, circling around to stand before her, his hand on her cheek and brushing away her lank hair. “Why are you crying? Did you not win a great tourney today? Did you not wed Lord Tywin’s golden daughter, the greatest prize in the West?”

“I won a great tourney and they laughed at me!” she choked out, balling her hand up into a fist. “I thought I had wed Lord Tywin’s golden daughter, the most beautiful creature I had ever seen, but she ran away and left me with Lord Tywin’s golden son! I am a laughingstock, ser, and if you cannot see why I am crying then you are a fool –”

He kissed her. She struck out with her fist, thumping it against his shoulder, but his mouth was soft and sweet and his skin was so warm beneath her hands, and he was so beautiful and she _had_ married him, after all.

“Come now, wife,” he said gently. “Surely it’s not so bad as all that. I think I’d rather like being married to you.”

“Your father will be furious,” she said.

“Let him,” he said, with his blithe, careless smile. “He’s been trying to marry me off for years. He can’t complain now.”

He kissed her again. She sighed, and rested her brow against his. “Oh very well,” she said. “I suppose you’ll do.”

He laughed, and pulled her down to the marriage bed.

**

**Author's Note:**

> *(discreetly covered)


End file.
